U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

63–765 CC WASHINGTON : 2000

COMBATING TERRORISM: ASSESSING THE THREAT

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY,

VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

OCTOBER 20, 1999

Serial No. 106–109

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEPHEN HORN, California

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia

DAVID M. MCINTOSH, Indiana

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

MARSHALL ‘‘MARK’’ SANFORD, South

Carolina

BOB BARR, Georgia

DAN MILLER, Florida

ASA HUTCHINSON, Arkansas

LEE TERRY, Nebraska

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois

GREG WALDEN, Oregon

DOUG OSE, California

PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin

HELEN CHENOWETH-HAGE, Idaho

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

ROBERT E. WISE, JR., West Virginia

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JIM TURNER, Texas

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

HAROLD E. FORD, JR., Tennessee

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

KEVIN BINGER, Staff Director

DANIEL R. MOLL, Deputy Staff Director

DAVID A. KASS, Deputy Counsel and Parliamentarian

CARLA J. MARTIN, Chief Clerk

PHIL SCHILIRO, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut, Chairman

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

DAVID M. MCINTOSH, Indiana

MARSHALL ‘‘MARK’’ SANFORD, South

Carolina

LEE TERRY, Nebraska

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois

HELEN CHENOWETH-HAGE, Idaho

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois

TOM LANTOS, California

ROBERT E. WISE, JR., West Virginia

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

LAWRENCE J. HALLORAN, Staff Director and Counsel

MICHELE LANG, Professional Staff Member

ROBERT NEWMAN, Professional Staff Member

JASON CHUNG, Clerk

DAVID RAPALLO, Minority Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on October 20, 1999 .......................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Hinton, Henry L., Jr., Assistant Comptroller General, National Security

and International Affairs Division, General Accounting Office, accompanied by Deborah A. Colantonio, Senior Evaluator; and Davi M.

D’Agostino, Assistant Director ..................................................................... 9

Jenkins, Brian M., senior advisor to the president, RAND; John V.

Parachini, senior associate, Center for Nonproliferation Studies,

Monterrey Institute of International Studies; and Raymond Zilinskas,

senior scientist in residence, Biological and Toxin Arms Control, Monterey Institute of International Studies ......................................................... 37

Letters, statements, et cetera, submitted for the record by:

Blagojevich, Hon. Rod R., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Illinois, prepared statement of ................................................................ 6

Hinton, Henry L., Jr., Assistant Comptroller General, National Security

and International Affairs Division, General Accounting Office:

Information concerning the Chemical Weapons Convention ................. 30

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 13

Jenkins, Brian M., senior advisor to the president, RAND, prepared statement of ........................................................................................................... 40

Parachini, John V., senior associate, Center for Nonproliferation Studies,

Monterrey Institute of International Studies, prepared statement of ...... 49

Shays, Hon. Christopher, a Representative in Congress from the State

of Connecticut, prepared statement of ........................................................ 3

Zilinskas, Raymond, senior scientist in residence, Biological and Toxin

Arms Control, Monterey Institute of International Studies, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 77

(1)

COMBATING TERRORISM: ASSESSING THE

THREAT

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1999

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS

AFFAIRS, AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM, Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:30 a.m., in room

2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Shays

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Present: Representatives Shays, Souder, Terry, and Blagojevich.

Staff present: Lawrence J. Halloran, staff director and counsel;

Michele Lang and Robert Newman, professional staff members;

Jason Chung, clerk; David Rapallo, minority counsel; and Earley

Green, minority staff assistant.

Mr. SHAYS. I would like to call this hearing to order. We are going to be having a vote, but I will see if I can get some of the preliminaries done.

This is our fifth hearing on Federal efforts to combat terrorism

at home and abroad. In previous sessions, we examined governmentwide spending coordination and specific programs to train

first responders, deploy National Guard rapid response teams and

strengthen public health capabilities to deal with weapons of mass

destruction.

Underlying all that testimony was one question: How should we

fix spending priorities and establish programs to meet an inherently unpredictable, constantly changing threat?

To address that question, we asked the General Accounting Office [GAO], to examine one dimension of the threat: the scientific

and practical aspects of terrorists carrying out large-scale chemical

or biological attacks on U.S. soil. Their report discusses the degrees

of difficulty terrorists face when trying to acquire, process, improvise and disseminate certain chemical and biological agents to inflict mass casualties of 1,000 or more. GAO recommends using that

type of information to improve systematic threat assessments and

refine Federal program targeting.

That will not be easy. By its nature, terrorism partakes of the

irrational and will not always succumb to rational dissection by the

tools of threat assessment and risk management. Any rigid ranking

of terrorists’ histories, capabilities, and intentions appears to

equate likelihood with lethality, understating the threat posed by

low probability, yet highly consequential, chemical and biological

attacks.

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But the threat can just as easily be overstated. Vulnerability

alone is an inadequate measure, drawing scarce resources in 1,000

directions. Preparing for every worst case scenario is neither practical nor affordable and carries the additional risk we terrorize ourselves by starving other fiscal priorities and surrendering civil liberties.

As the threat of biological and chemical terrorism evolves, so

should our response. Just as we learned to assess, and to a degree

accept, the nuclear threat in the 1950’s and 1960’s, our assessment

of the risks posed by terrorism will need to adapt to the changing

world environment of the next century.

Federal programs, not known for flexibility or adaptability, will

need to change as well. What will guide those changes? Increasingly sophisticated judgments or generalized fears? Prudent planning or budgetary momentum? These are the issues we will confront today, and in future hearings, as our oversight continues.

Our witnesses this morning bring significant expertise and insight to our discussion of an important national security issue. We

appreciate their time and look forward to their testimony.

At this time, I ask if Mr. Souder has any comments he would like

to make.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Christopher Shays follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. No.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me take care of unanimous consents. I ask unanimous consent that all members of the subcommittee be permitted

to place an opening statement in the record and that the record remain open for 3 days for that purpose, and without objection, so ordered.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Rod R. Blagojevich follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I ask further unanimous consent that all witnesses

be permitted to include their written statements in the record and,

without objection, so ordered.

As our first witness, we have Henry Hinton, Jr., Assistant Comptroller General, National Security and International Affairs Division, General Accounting Office; and Deborah A. Colantonio and

Davi M. D’Agostino. And would you state your titles?

Ms. COLANTONIO. I am a Senior Evaluator.

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. I am an Assistant Director.

Mr. SHAYS. Why don’t you start your testimony? I think you will

be able to finish, and then we will have a vote.

Mr. HINTON. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Souder——

Mr. SHAYS. Excuse me, we do swear everyone in, including yourself.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SHAYS. For the record, everyone has responded in the affirmative.

We will do 5 minutes and then roll the clock over for another 5

minutes.

STATEMENT OF HENRY L. HINTON, JR., ASSISTANT COMPTROLLER GENERAL, NATIONAL SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS DIVISION, GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE, ACCOMPANIED BY DEBORAH A. COLANTONIO, SENIOR

EVALUATOR; AND DAVI M. D’AGOSTINO, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR

Mr. HINTON. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Souder, I am pleased to be here

this morning to discuss our recent report on combating terrorism

that you referred to.

I will first discuss the ease or difficulty for terrorists to conduct

large-scale chemical and biological attacks.

Second, I will cover the extent to which the threat of such attacks have been assessed.

But before I begin, Mr. Chairman, I want to clarify for you what

we did and what we did not do in our work.

We consulted with experts in numerous fields to look at the scientific and practical aspects of terrorists successfully carrying out

large-scale chemical or biological attacks that might cause mass

casualties of at least 1,000. We also considered the fact that the

terrorists would be operating illegally and outside a state-run laboratory or weapon program. We did not address the possibility of

a rogue scientist or official from a state program providing agents

or their weapons from their programs to a terrorist organization,

nor did we examine the ease or difficulty for states to successfully

produce these weapons.

Overall, Mr. Chairman, we found that terrorists trying to make

chemical or biological weapons would have to overcome a number

of significant technical challenges to cause mass casualties. Some

people might be surprised because this conflicts with the many suggestions that have been made in the media and elsewhere that it

is easy to prepare agents in your kitchen, your bathtub and your

garage.

Chemical and biological experts and intelligence agency officials

believe that ease or difficulty for terrorists to cause mass casualties

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with an improvised weapon or device depends on the agent selected. Experts from the scientific intelligence and law enforcement

communities told us that terrorists did not need sophisticated

knowledge or dissemination methods to use toxic industrial chemicals such as chlorine. In contrast, terrorists would need a relatively

high degree of sophistication to successfully cause mass casualties

with some other chemical and most biological agents. Specialized

knowledge would be needed to acquire the right biological agent or

precursor chemicals, process the chemical or biological agent, improvise a weapon and disseminate it. Throughout the different

stages of the process, terrorists would run the risk of hurting themselves and being detected and would have to overcome these challenges.

Let me break these down further, Mr. Chairman, and call your

attention to this chart that is before you. It gives you an idea of

some of the stages and the challenges that go into making these

types of weapons.

Note the cloud in the upper left-hand corner. A terrorist would

need to possess certain technical skills. Experts in the various

fields, including those formerly with state-sponsored weapons programs, told us that many skills are required to successfully research, develop, produce and disseminate weapons of this type. For

example, knowledge and expertise in the fields of physics, meteorology, microbiology and chemistry would come into play.

Also, when dealing with biological weapons, experts agree that

only those individuals who work on weaponizing agents in a state

biological warfare program are likely to possess the specialized

knowledge.

Next as shown in the top box, a terrorist would need to acquire

basic chemicals or infectious biological seed cultures. Basic chemicals necessary for the production of some chemical agents are controlled by the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention.

Chemical experts told us that illegal acquisition of large quantities of precursor chemicals would raise red flags, and most nerve

agents like sarin have to be delivered in large quantities. The critical exception to this and other challenges for making a chemical attack is toxic industrial chemicals. Chemicals like chlorine or phosgene are ready available. They don’t require any mixing. They are

dangerous just the way that they are.

A hurdle for terrorists trying to make biological weapons is to get

sufficiently deadly or infectious seed stocks of the bacteria or virus,

especially since controls over these stocks have improved. In our

former biological warfare program the United States investigated

numerous strains of biological warfare agents before finding ones

that were highly infectious.

In the second box, terrorists would need to synthesize chemical

agents or grow biological agents. For some chemical agents, a terrorist must mix the right amounts of different types of chemicals

together in an appropriate container. Biological agents are relatively easy to grow, but a terrorist has to be very careful not to

contaminate them with other bacteria or viruses that might kill or

interfere with the agents’ effects.

Even if a terrorist goes through this stage, there are more stages

to complete. As shown in the third box, a terrorist would need to

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process the agents into a form that can be effectively delivered.

Specialized knowledge is needed because some steps in the production process of nerve agents are difficult and hazardous. A technical challenge includes containing highly toxic gases. For biological agents, a terrorist has to make a wet or dry product with the

right particle size to form a stable aerosol so that the particles

reach the small air sacs deep in the lungs. And if a terrorist is trying to make the dry product, special precautions would need to be

taken to avoid killing the biological agent in the process.

As depicted in the fourth box, a terrorist would have to improvise

an agent delivery device to cause mass casualties. Even if the

chemical agents can be produced successfully, they must be released effectively as a vapor or as an aerosol to be inhaled.

Another method for certain chemicals is to spray large droplets

for skin penetration, and for biological agents a terrorist would

have to use the right equipment with the right speed to disseminate the agent effectively. If the biological agent is not stabilized

and disseminated with the proper energy rate, then the biological

agent can lose its ability to cause injury.

Last, in the fifth box, and the remaining cloud, a terrorist would

have to effectively release the selected agent to cause mass casualties. Both chemical and biological agents need to maintain their

strength during release. This is a challenge posed by the very nature of the agents themselves.

Terrorists must also deal with additional hurdles. For example,

outdoor delivery of agents can be disrupted by environmental and

meteorological conditions. If wind conditions are too erratic or

strong, the agent might dissipate.

Terrorists risk capture and personal safety in acquiring and processing materials, disposing of by-products and releasing the agents.

Many agents are dangerous to handle. In some cases, the lack of

an effective vaccine, antibiotic, antiviral treatment or antidote

poses the same risk to the terrorist as it does to the targeted population.

Let me turn now to the second issue regarding the extent to

which threat and risk assessments have been done. As you know,

numerous Federal agencies—and you have made reference to that

in your remarks—are spending billions of dollars and initiating

several new programs to prepare for the possibility of a terrorist

attack. It is not clear that these investments are targeted toward

the right program solutions in the right amounts.

We have found that the intelligence community has assessed the

more likely chemical and biological threat agents to be used by foreign terrorists, but there is no comparable formal assessment that

has been done by the FBI for domestic origin threats.

Also, we determined that there is need for a national level assessment that would enable the Nation to focus on the more likely

chemical and biological threats. If done properly, this risk assessment would also target our programs and resources more effectively and economically.

In our report we recommended that the Attorney General direct

the FBI to perform these assessments to help establish and

prioritize program requirements. The Justice Department agreed

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with us on the need for these assessments, as did the Department

of Defense and the CIA.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes my summary remarks. My colleagues and I will be pleased to respond to your questions.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hinton follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I just want to note for the record that Lee Terry is

here as well.

I am going to recognize you, Mr. Souder, first, but that is after

I ask one question. Mr. Hinton, do you believe a nuclear, biological

or chemical attack will take place in the United States sometime

in the next 20 years?

Mr. HINTON. Based on what we have seen in our work, Mr.

Chairman, we are being advised by the intelligence community

that the likelihood that this could happen, an attempt of this sort,

is growing.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Mr. Souder.

Mr. SOUDER. Pardon my voice. I don’t have much of one today.

In the bulk of your presentation you were talking about the difficulty of terrorists kind of having the ability to execute an attack

that I believe you said in your opening paragraph, defined as at

least 1,000 deaths. Does this change if you lower that? Could there

be less than a mass catastrophe?

Mr. HINTON. Just going through the process, it is very difficult

to successfully pull that off—to cause casualties at levels of 1,000

or a couple hundred. I think, as we saw in Japan not too long ago,

it wasn’t a quality effort. It did affect a small population. That

event, even though small, was serious. What was larger was probably the psychological impact that resuslts from such an incident

regardless of the number of casualties.

My answer is, as you look at whether 1,000, several hundred, I

think the steps that we have talked about, the operational and

technical parts have to be done in such a way as to be effective before you can have that level of casualty.

Mr. SHAYS. Would the gentleman just suspend? I am going to

vote quickly and have you carry on, and just leave with 5 minutes

to go, and then we will reconvene when I return.

Mr. SOUDER [presiding]. In the difficulty of delivery systems, the

knowledge that this requires and so on, would that not suggest on

the surface that foreign threats are probably more serious than domestic threats?

Mr. HINTON. I think, Mr. Souder, until we see an analysis of the

various threats, both that have been done by the intelligence community and those that we have asked the FBI to undertake, and

that using that information and going through a risk assessment

process which isolates scenarios, which might have as their base

the different types of agents that would be involved, to look at the

likelihood of these events occurring and if they did occur, what

would be the criticality of the events, I don’t know which part of

those threats are more serious than the other.

I think this is very important as part of the process that governmental agencies that are working this issue need to go through.

And in doing that and in coming to those solutions it gives them

a way to manage the most serious risk that they see. It might not

alleviate all of the risk, but it puts us into a position to come up

with countermeasures to go after the higher order of risks that are

out there. I don’t think that there is any substitute for having good

intelligence and contingency planning along these lines.

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Mr. SOUDER. It has been hard to get a handle around the different types of threat. By showing the difficulty, it narrows it. This

is especially true when you are talking about a domestic situation

and American citizens and trying to analyze this without getting

into overly classified and high-risk information. We have had public testimony here that most of the foreign threat to American citizens have come from Osama bin Laden and his network because

they had some of the delivery systems, at least in a regional way,

and then Japan, the FARC, but very few networks have done that.

When you start to get into domestic, it starts to get really hairy.

I have talked to Mr. Blitzer a number of times about what kinds

of groups do you target. Do you say, we have had some pro-life protesters protest at clinics; therefore, any of them at this time could

theoretically do this. What about people who are part of the Montana group or whatever, the citizen rights groups? And all of a sudden you are speculative.

How would you start to apply some of what you have here to a

domestic analysis, because you have raised that? And given the

type of technical things that you say here, for example, would people who have worked at a biological or a chemical lab who have

been fired or who have been unstable, would you start tracking

those kinds of people? You are saying that there are technical

things that are needed and it is not just an ideological anger. You

need technical people. How do you bring that together along with

the question of their American citizenship?

Mr. HINTON. One, getting the FBI to be supportive of the recommendation that we made to move domestically in this regard is

a good first step. It starts dealing with the question of who/what

might be the type of threat that is out there.

This is evolving. It is not quick and easy, and it is something

that we constantly have to come back to revisit, and update as

events around the country change or change overseas.

I think that a first step, then allows you to identify what that

threat might be and then start putting that threat along with other

information from the law enforcement community, the intelligence

community that we have and other sources together to start assessing each of those threats from where they might come. Then look

upon what is the likelihood that you might have an event and come

up with countermeasures against various dependent scenarios.

That threat might be multiple things that you have to look at,

chemical and biological agents being a part of it, as well as any

threats along conventional lines of using bombs, or explosives,

which seem to be the more prominent part that we see here now

in the United States.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

I will yield to Mr. Terry.

Mr. TERRY. A couple of quick questions so we can go vote.

Just picking up on a couple of your answers in the portion of

your testimony that I heard—sorry about being late—is there a

problem at the FBI? Are they dragging their feet on this issue? It

seems that some of the answers—you are not saying it overtly, but

is one of the barriers to implementing a more cohesive policy involving the FBI; and if you say that the FBI needs to become more

involved, is there a problem there?

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Mr. HINTON. No, Mr. Terry, I don’t want you to think that. When

we first got into this our thinking was at a much broader community level, but as we worked with the intelligence community,

DOD, HHS, and the others, the FBI came up and said, we ought

to be the agency that sponsors a national-level risk assessment.

Mr. TERRY. Do you agree with that?

Mr. HINTON. Yes. All of the Federal players felt that we should

put that responsibility with the FBI.

Mr. TERRY. Why should they be the hub of the spokes?

Mr. HINTON. They have the lead responsibility in crisis events,

and they have a pretty good ability to tap into the communities out

there in terms of different intelligence sources and the threats that

are out there.

I don’t want you to think, too, that they have been inactive in

this debate. They have gone through quite a bit of research on

their own and have come up with broad groupings of the different

types of threats out there, but we have not advanced domestically

like I think we have internationally in looking at the specific

threats that are out there, and that is what we were trying to move

to, to isolate the specific threats that might be reason for concern.

Mr. TERRY. Where are we in the process here?

Another hint that I interpreted from your answers and your

statement is that we have a lot of people talking and studying and

looking at it. Now we need to tie everybody together. That has

probably been haphazard to date but is probably the first step.

First of all, you have to identify that there is an issue and then

a need. The second part is becoming cohesive and tying that into

a plan.

Where are we in that process? Do we need to focus everybody?

Are we to that next phase where we can be more comprehensive?

Mr. HINTON. We are at that stage. We have been looking at this

for several years, and what we have seen is a growth in the Federal expenditures throughout the government to address in this

whole arena.

What we have not seen through our work a process to put in

place the identification of the various threats and an assessment

process that will allow you to take those threats and related scenarios to come up with countermeasures for those in some coordinated fashion. That has been the subject of several recommendations that we have made. I am pleased that we have gotten a response at this point to move in that direction. I think it is constructive. I think the more intelligence that we gain, the more contingency planning, the process will only get better as it goes forward.

Mr. TERRY. One last question. Now developing this next phase as

you described, the FBI’s involvement as being the hub here to help

us organize focus, become comprehensive, where are they in the

process of implementing any of these recommendations, NunnLugar, Domenici? Where are they in the process?

Mr. HINTON. I think they are in the early beginnings of it.

On the Nunn-Lugar, we had a recommendation a while back, and

it was picked up in the 1999 defense authorization legislation for

them to develop some methodologies and assess the possibility of

weapons of mass destruction threat against several cities. They

were given about a year I think from when that legislation passed

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to complete the task. They are not at the point of fully executing

that yet. They have started working the methodologies, and I think

they are going to be evolving in this area.

Mr. TERRY. Thank you.

Mr. HINTON. Yes, sir, Mr. Terry.

Mr. SHAYS [presiding]. Thank you, Mr. Hinton.

We made a decision to have this hearing public, and we invited

DOD and the CIA to come and testify, but their preference is to

testify in a hearing that would not be open to the public and therefore we could get at the issues that we can’t get into in a public

forum like this.

In the question do you believe that a nuclear or chemical or biological attack could happen in the 20 years, your answer was that

it is appearing more and more likely that we will have to deal to

some degree with one of those three types of weapons of mass destruction.

Mr. HINTON. Mr. Chairman, I think the keyword here is an ‘‘attempt’’ in the chemical and biological area and that is where I

would like to have my remarks focused. On the nuclear side, I

haven’t done the research yet to comment on that.

Mr. SHAYS. Tell me the difference—terrorists don’t play by the

same rules, so tell me the difference between dealing with a rogue

nation, a nation that might use one of these three weapons of mass

destruction and a terrorist organization?

Mr. HINTON. Well, I think if you look at it from a state environment, you have more resources. You probably have access to expertise that you need. You might well have a sophisticated machine

that can move in that direction to do those types of things. I guess

it is the goals and the intent that they want to advance.

I think also that you have to look at the in objectives. And when

it comes to a terrorist, the question is, do they have the same capacity that a state-sponsored organization might have? Would they

have the same level of resources and the same knowledge and

those types of things? Also, you have to look into the motives and

the objectives which they are trying to achieve.

Mr. SHAYS. Versus the terrorists—a terrorist has to live somewhere, so there has to be some environment that enables them to

exist and potentially train and so on.

What is the likelihood that—if we are dealing with foreign terrorists, that we would know the country that basically has sponsored them or has allowed them to live there?

Mr. HINTON. We are getting very close to some of the concerns

that I think the CIA and others raised to you.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me put it this way. In most instances, do we believe that we would know if a terrorist was sponsored by a foreign

country?

Mr. HINTON. I think that the intelligence community would probably have indications of that based on their research.

Mr. SHAYS. In determining the risks, we asked you to look at casualties of over 1,000 or more. If that number were to drop to 200

injuries, would your study be all that different?

Mr. HINTON. No, sir, I don’t think it would. Probably to have casualties of that magnitude you almost need to go through the same

process discussed here in terms of coming up with and overcoming

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the challenges that one would have in coming up with an agent or

a device to cause that magnitude of casualties.

The events that we saw in Japan not too long ago, the casualties

of deaths were smaller but a large number were injuries, and that

was serious. But I think also, looking at that incident there is a

huge psychological impact that comes along when you see events

like that.

But I think in terms of whether I would lower from 1,000 to 200,

I wouldn’t see much difference in terms of the technical and operational challenges.

Mr. SHAYS. When I read your report, I thought in a way—my

first reaction was that it seemed to minimize the threat to me a

bit. Then I thought about it more and changed my view a bit.

Let me say that there was a student before I was a Member of

Congress who lived in Norwalk, CT and went to Princeton, and his

assignment was to see if he could go to material in any—in some

of our libraries, material that would be available and construct a

nuclear weapon. And he ended up doing that. We are going back

I think 18 years ago. So the thought now is that one doesn’t have

to go anywhere other than just turn on their computer. The ability

to make—to know—to have the directions on how to make a nuclear or chemical or biological agent is pretty much available. So

then the issue is do you have the technical skills to be able to

make—let us just talk chemical or biological.

We have Americans and foreigners who obviously have tremendous technical skills. Am I to infer that just because it requires—

I say just—am I to infer that having the technical skill makes it

unlikely that a nuclear or biological agent won’t occur? Or should

I make an assumption that there are enough people who possess

these technical skills that we need to be concerned? In other words,

I want you to walk me through this chart, particularly the side corners, and have you tell me what that really means. Start with possess requisite technical skills first.

Mr. HINTON. Well, you need specialized skills in this arena.

There are a lot of risks. The process gets into acquiring, handling,

processing, and manufacturing. To understand those risks and to

deal with them and come up an agent that can be weaponized is

technically challenging, with the exception of toxic industrial

chemicals such as chlorine, which is already in the commercial

market.

Mr. SHAYS. One of the basic points in the report was that a

chemical agent is more likely than biological because a chemical

agent can be bought in an industrial setting?

Mr. HINTON. Right. Those such as chlorine and phosgene.

Mr. SHAYS. There are literally potentially not just thousands of

people, but tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people who possess the technical skills. We are not talking about just

a few geniuses around the country.

Mr. HINTON. That is correct. You are right on that. But there is

a lot of information that is not publicly available, we know, Mr.

Chairman, that would be needed to successfully go through all of

these processes and weaponize an agent.

Mr. SHAYS. Let’s just take them one at a time.

27

First off, the technical skills, we have hundreds of thousands of

people potentially——

Mr. HINTON. Right.

Mr. SHAYS [continuing]. With those technical skills. You realize

when we put the whole package together we minimize, fortunately,

the number. And I realize that in going through a process like this,

it can help us find out where we need to focus our time and attention.

So I think this is—but I just want to—I don’t want us to dismiss

it by saying that someone needs technical skills as if we don’t have

to be concerned.

Mr. HINTON. No. I understand where you are going right now. It

has got to be the people with certain motives. They might be individuals or groups. Not everyone who has those technical skills are

going to want to participate, depending on the motives or the skill

or the objectives of what the terrorist might want to do.

Mr. SHAYS. It seems what I am hearing is, in one case, you need

one kind of technical skill, and then in order to get it through to

the point at which it becomes a weapon, you’ve had a lot of different people with different skills come into play. So, in other

words, one person—I guess one of the messages that I am getting

is a Unabomber may be able to make a bomb, but it is less likely

that they are going to be able to make a weapon of mass destruction, clearly nuclear, but also chemical or biological, there is going

to be more than one person that is going to have to be involved?

Mr. HINTON. I would say that is probably the case unless they

have had past experience.

Mr. SHAYS. But as I go down this chart, you start out with biological or chemical cultures. You have to acquire and synthesize,

you have to process and then you have to deliver the system. They

are all going to take different skills.

Mr. HINTON. Right. As my statement—in the remarks, there are

different types of skills, from physicists, meteorologists, those types

of people, you are going to need their technical knowledge. From

the research that we have done and the people that we have spoken to, you are going to have to bring a host of those technical

skills to bear in this issue.

Mr. SHAYS. Which suggests to me that, in many instances, they

are going to have to have the cooperation of a country that is willing to—the more vigilant a country is, the more difficult it is going

to be for someone to have this kind of activity take place in that

country. The more friendly that country is to a terrorist’s efforts,

obviously the more likely it is going to happen. This is the challenge.

The bottom line is that we are spending over $10 billion a year

trying to deal with a chemical or biological threat. One danger

would be to minimize the likelihood because then that gives us a

false sense of comfort. Another danger is for us to make it more

dramatic than it is. But the bottom line is that you even felt this

way. There are a number of us who feel that a nuclear or chemical

or biological terrorist attack is—is not a question of if, it is a question of where and when and to what degree.

We want to make sure that we are maximizing all of our resources, and that is the purpose of your report, to say that we are

28

going to have to make choices. I am trying to get a feeling for how

you begin to compartmentalize this effort and begin to know how

to do that.

When you say technical skills, I am struck with the fact that is

not a significant barrier. There are a lot of people with technical

skills. The challenge begins when you try to synthesize this whole

effort and get the people who have those skills coming together.

And as soon as you get more than one person involved, then the

phrase on the right side as I look at your chart ‘‘avoid detection by

authorities,’’ becomes more and more difficult.

Could you speak to some personal risk where no vaccines or antidotes are available?

Mr. HINTON. Do you want to take that?

Ms. COLANTONIO. Yes. It is almost a catch-22, Mr. Chairman. If

terrorists were to work with in particular a biological weapon and

if they were not able to vaccinate themselves, they run the risk of

hurting themselves.

But if we want to step back and go through the process of handling the biological agent, whether it be a virus or a bacteria, and

they are growing it and they are processing it and working with

it and they are working with specialized equipment and specialized

types of ingredients that they need to use to get to a liquid or to

a dry form, they run the risk of perhaps inhaling the agent themselves. If the terrorists don’t have the proper vaccines or if there

are not proper antidotes available, they could possibly harm themselves, infect themselves or die.

Let me give you an example. When you work with a dry biological agent and you have rubber gloves on, a dry biological agent

tends to stick to your gloves. That poses a risk. That is a concrete

example of a risk factor for a terrorist. So you have the biological

agent on your gloves. It is sticking to your gloves. And so if you

have somebody pull the gloves off for you, that individual can be

infected perhaps or if you happen to inhale this because we know

you—the process of inhaling any type of biological weapon and in

some cases chemical weapons one can become ill.

Mr. SHAYS. Describe to me the differences between the challenges for the terrorist with a chemical versus biological?

Ms. COLANTONIO. For example, for chemical agents, there is a

process where these agents are corrosive. There are nasty by-products that have to be dealt with and disposed of. You have to, for

example, get the right temperatures for the materials. So you have

to be careful when heating or cooling. You have to handle highly

toxic gases.

With biological agents, when you are dealing with a wet agent,

you are growing your media, and you have to, from your wet

media, get your actual live bacteria or virus out of your growth material so you have to filter out the by-product from your growth. If

you were to stop there, then you have to get this into containers

or store it. So, again, there are by-products that you have to dispose of.

If you want to go from a liquid biological agent to a dry biological

agent, you have to go through a drying process and you’ve some

risks involved there in terms of just handling the material, at all

stages carefully.

29

You also have to—for example, with biological agents have to

have the right respiratory equipment, like a filter that you are

breathing with, and you have to make sure that you are secure,

you have a secure hood that won’t let these particles into your

mouth, nose, or eyes.

Mr. HINTON. To bring that back to your question about the skills:

the skills that you need to weaponize, whether it be chemical or biological, are not as plentiful as we might think. I think that is important from the perspective we were discussing a little while ago

about the skills. It is all the delicate parts that Deborah was bringing out to you there. As you move through that process in the various stages, the weaponization is a real critical part of this, for

which the skill base may not be as plentiful.

Mr. SHAYS. The chemical weapon convention hasn’t been fully

adopted and defined, correct?

Mr. HINTON. That’s correct. Not everybody has signed up to it.

Mr. SHAYS. How many chemical companies are subject to inspection under the CWC, the Chemical Weapons Convention?

Mr. HINTON. I don’t have that, Mr. Chairman. We can get that

and provide it for the record.

[The information referred to follows:]

30

31

Mr. SHAYS. If, say, 1,000 of the chemical companies who are subject to inspection, what are the chances of a sham company receiving a chemical weapon, precursor chemicals being inspected?

Mr. HINTON. I don’t have a good answer. We have not looked at

that issue, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. When we were in Geneva, that was one of the questions that we were trying to get a handle on. You have a certain

group that play by the rules, but we just wonder if others can get

the precursors that ultimately lead to the weapon.

In the chart that you gave us, you talk about the stages and then

the obstacles. One of the obstacles I note that is not there is

money. How come?

Mr. HINTON. We could add that. There is another one that is not

there either, testing. Money and testing are two that are on our

minds. What I was trying to do was walk you through the operational aspects.

Mr. SHAYS. To make a better chart you can add those two.

Mr. HINTON. We will.

Mr. SHAYS. Are there any others?

Mr. HINTON. Money is an issue. Also testing, and testing in the

sense that once you have something, you want to make sure that

it works. And the only way you can find that out beforehand is to

test it, but there are risks associated with that.

The other issue, too, while I think the chart is rich in the sense

of the stages and the challenges, is the time that is involved in this

process, too.

Mr. SHAYS. I note that we are joined by our ranking member. I

will continue to allow you an opportunity to catch up.

You mentioned in your testimony the smallpox virus is available

only in the United States of America and Russia. Could it have

been proliferated beyond Russia and how dangerous is smallpox

compared to anthrax?

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. Based on our review throughout the entire year

that——

Mr. SHAYS. Could you lower your mic a little bit?

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. Sorry.

Mr. SHAYS. That is all right.

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. Based on our reviews, there was no credible

evidence available that the smallpox virus has been proliferated to

other countries or individuals.

What we don’t know about is the level of security specifically on

the smallpox cultures in Russia. We don’t have really good, sound,

corroborated information about that. We also don’t know whether

or not terrorists really are interested in getting smallpox and using

it. So we are kind of short on answers and other pertinent questions that you might want to ask before you undertake a very large

program.

In terms of smallpox, I guess everybody has billed it as a low

probability but high consequence attack scenario, and I think we

would agree with that. But, unlike anthrax, smallpox is very contagious. And it is a severe illness with an estimated fatality rate

of about 30 percent, which is very low compared to a successful inhalation anthrax attack which can lead to an 80 to 90 percent

lethality rate.

32

The vaccinations, obviously, have not been given for smallpox for

many years, partly because the disease has been eradicated. It is

just not clear to us at this time that smallpox is a very attractive

biological weapon for a terrorist based on what we have seen.

Mr. SHAYS. Right. Thank you.

Could you please comment on Mr. Hamre’s, the Deputy Secretary

of Defense, recent statement before the House Armed Services

Committee that, one, North Korea has weaponized anthrax; and,

two, it is easy to weaponize biological warfare agents.

Mr. HINTON. We haven’t seen the evidence to support Mr.

Hamre’s statement that North Korea has weaponized. But it is

something that we would be happy to look into for you, Mr. Chairman. Based on the evidence that we now have, we have a disconnect.

On the second issue—easy to weaponize, that, too, is different

from the information that we have, and, as I have discussed

through the process, it is another area that I need to inquire about

so that we can understand the basis for those statements.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Let me ask Mr. Blagojevich if he has questions, and then I will

just come back for a few more questions.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Thank you.

Mr. Hinton, you evidently had made the point just moments ago

that the threat of a nuclear or biological attack has been overstated

and not nearly as threatening as some of the popular literature

lately might suggest. Can you tell us what you are talking about

when you say that and who is overstating that threat and how they

are doing it?

Mr. HINTON. My comment, Congressman, was more to the point

that, based on the information that we have received from the work

that we have done through the intelligence community and all, that

the data and the evidence would suggest that there might be an

attempt down the road in the chemical and biological area. I have

not had any review around the nuclear area at this point, but it

might be an attempt somewhere down the road.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Is it your conclusion that some of the discussions in the public domain regarding a threat of a chemical or biological terrorist attack has been overstated? And if that is in fact

your conclusion, can you give us examples of where and who is

doing it?

Mr. HINTON. Some overstatement has been made regarding how

to go about acquiring, manufacturing, weaponizing an agent, and

it has been made out to be easier than the evidence through our

work would suggest. We have discussed the various operational

and technical challenges to do this and—so it contradicts some of

what has been in the press and the media about how easy it is to

do.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Your report states that potential terrorist attacks carried out, and I am quoting from your report, ‘‘without access to state-run laboratories or weapons programs.’’ Now, limiting

the qualifying—the discussion on potential terrorist attacks by that

statement, does that arbitrarily restrict your analysis?

33

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. We don’t think that it arbitrarily restricts our

analysis. What it did was help define the parameters of our analysis, and we don’t see it as necessarily a limiting factor.

The question that you raised by that scope definition is whether

or not a state actor would be willing to provide a terrorist group

or organization with their chemical or biological weapons. That is

a question that the intelligence community has looked at, and we

can’t discuss their position on that matter in this forum. But it has

been looked at, and they have come to conclusions and judgments

about that very matter.

I think that in comment on our report, the Department of Health

and Human Services raised that issue, and we did say that could

be part of a risk assessment. But there are some judgments out

there on the part of the community about that question. So you

could factor that into the assessment.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Some of the language in the report also indicates receiving chemical or biological agents or weapons from such

countries, that being a statement in your report that terrorists

would not be—your conclusion is predicated on the thought that

terrorists would not have access to some of the material from certain countries that may have it; is that true? Is that essentially a

fair statement of your report?

Mr. HINTON. Yes.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. OK. I am asking these questions in the context of the fluidity of the material that we are talking about and

the experts that are presently leaving the former Soviet Union.

Russia has acknowledged—is acknowledged as the world’s largest

stockpile of chemical agents, including 40,000 metric tons of chemical agents. It included various delivery systems, such as artillery

aerial bombs, rockets and missiles. In 1992, Boris Yeltsin revealed

that the Soviet Union conducted its biological warfare program in

violation of the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention.

My question is: With all of this information, do you believe Soviet

decentralization, the process going on now in the former Soviet

Union with all of the talk of criminal syndicates and so forth, has

this posed a significant concern with regard to the flight of Russian

scientists and materials?

Ms. COLANTONIO. Congressman, I think the one thing that we

have to remember is that if the chemical and biological agents are

stockpiled, in order to be effective and cause the mass casualties,

they have to be released effectively, be disseminated, and be

weaponized.

Our work—as Mr. Hinton has discussed earlier, there are certain

steps that you have to go through, and what we found in our work

is that as agents sit on the shelf, they possibly could lose some of

their stability and strength.

Now, in terms of rogue or errant former Soviet Union scientists

passing out information, we do not—there is no credible evidence

that suggests that is going on. In fact, there was a senior fellow

at the University of Maryland who did some investigation on the

Aum Shinrikyo group, and it was suggested that the Aum had contacted a former Soviet Union scientist to get his expertise, and it

just appeared in the media as if the scientist provided the Aum the

information.

34

Through this investigation, it was suggested that the Aum wasn’t

able to get any kind of technical information.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. The conclusions that some of you have

reached in terms of the threat of terrorism, did it contemplate a

terrorist organization that might purchase chemical agents or a delivery system from a former Soviet state, or was that consideration

outside the parameters of your analysis and the conclusions that

you ultimately reached?

Ms. COLANTONIO. Congressman, that was outside our parameters. What we wanted to look at was whether individuals, whether

they are defined as terrorists or religious sects or cult groups,

whether these individuals or groups of people can actually perform

the stages, OK, and do the science and actually go from a growth

media or a chemical to actually effectively weaponize and release.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. So the concentration was on producing and

weaponizing the various agents, that was the concentration of your

study?

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. Right, outside of the state-run laboratories

where you would have a lot of resources marshalled around solving

the types of problems in getting an effective biological or chemical

weapon.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Having said that, is it fair to assume on my

part that you have excluded the possibility that this technology

could be stolen by a terrorist organization from a foreign state?

That is excluded from the analysis?

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. It is excluded from our analysis, but we are not

ruling out the possibility. We did not weigh the likelihood or the

risk of that occurring.

Ms. COLANTONIO. May I add that, even if you have the technology, you have to have the ‘‘smarts’’ in order to weaponize, to disseminate, OK, a biological or chemical agent.

For example, with a biological agent, the best way to cause casualties is to aerosolize the agent, and as Mr. Hinton mentioned earlier in his remarks—you have to use the proper equipment with the

proper rates or speed and use of energy in order to do this.

Not only that, some of the other clouds come into play in terms

of what a terrorist has to do, for example under the right weather

conditions.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. In closing here, let me throw out one hypothetical. Iran has some money. They cultivate a Russian scientist

who needs money and has expertise in chemical and biological matters. As part of a terrorist organization funded by Iran, they have

this person produce weaponized various agents. They are prepared

to steal products if necessary. That kind of a hypothetical was not

considered in terms of the analysis that you are providing; and if

in fact I am right, then doesn’t this undercut your conclusion that

the threat has been overstated by not considering all aspects of this

threat?

Mr. HINTON. The specifics of that were not addressed as part of

this. It doesn’t rule it out. I don’t think that it undercuts our conclusions, that to go through the entire process that we have laid

out and discussed this morning, that it is highly dependent on the

agent—whether it is a chemical or biological agent that is chosen.

It is not easy to do. It is a challenge, and it is something that the

35

intelligence community looking overseas and the FBI looking domestically has got to stay focused on. And I think that process is

moving right now toward assessing the various hypothetical scenarios that we are talking about.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. You are basically making an interesting point to me

that all terrorists aren’t the same, and I am stuck with the fact

that we are trying to develop a rational approach, which is something that I tried to allude to in my statement, and we are dealing

in many cases with irrational terrorists.

We are going to have some interesting time in our next panel

going through this, but Raymond Zilinskas says, on page 12, kind

of making reference to this, the last full paragraph, ‘‘This problem

may be illustrated by referring to the microbiology technician Larry

Wayne Harris. During an interview conducted in September, 1999,

by a German reporter, Harris was asked whether he would use biological weapons. He replied, ’If God tells me to do it, I will.’’’ And

then he goes on to say that no risk assessor would be in a position

to determine if and when God gives Harris, or others of his ilk, the

requisite command.

I think it is a cautionary word.

Would you describe how you envision a national threat and risk

management could be conducted? That is kind of a big question.

Maybe you can just kind of address it.

Mr. HINTON. Sure, Mr. Chairman, and I think our report does a

pretty good job of laying that out and how we envision that working. Basically, the concept is that you would take all of the available threat assessments that have been done throughout the intelligence communities, both internationally and those that we would

have domestically through the FBI, that they have agreed to do in

response to our recommendation. This is a starting point for the

process of doing a risk assessment. And we would think that then

you would bring in a team of multidisciplinary folks, from the law

enforcement community, from the science community and others, to

weigh in on this, particularly terrorism experts, that get at the

point that you just raised—to help sort through what are the likely

threat scenarios; what agents might be involved in those threat

scenarios and think through the likelihood of those events occurring, the in-severity, if they did occur—what could really happen

and then begin to pose countermeasures. That would begin to lay

out a process by which you could decide on the risks at hand and

what you want to do to mitigate those risks.

I don’t think that you are going to rule risk out totally, or completely. I think it is a process that is going to come back. You are

going to have to revisit it as more data and information are

brought to bear. You are going to have to go back and review those

assessments that you have done.

I think the FBI and the Justice Department’s response to our report furthers the process by which the government is approaching

this.

The foreign-origin threats, are being handled through the intelligence community. What was missing from the picture in the

threat assessment was the domestic piece. This is a step to move

that process forward. Now we have got the FBI that is going to

36

sponsor the risk assessment to look domestically. So I think the

process is evolving, and I think what we have got to see now is

what comes out of the process once they go through the analysis

we have recommended.

Mr. SHAYS. How will this type of assessment help us focus resources better?

Mr. HINTON. When you see the likely scenarios, and what are

likely to be involved in those scenarios, it will help make resource

decisions. There might be some that you will rule out immediately

that you don’t move forward on or invest in. For example, where

smallpox might fall in the scenario development could be used to

gauge whether or not we want to be making the investments in the

national pharmaceutical stockpile and vaccines that HHS is moving toward. But I think it would give you an affirmation if it is or

what is in line with the priority threats the Nation may face.

We know from some of our past work looking at that issue as it

involved HHS is that some of the threats that were on its list were

not consistent with the threats that were on the intelligence community’s list.

Mr. SHAYS. Interesting.

Have you looked at the possibility of terrorists just taking over

a nuclear plant, electrical generating plant and blowing it up?

Ms. D’AGOSTINO. The DOE has focused on that scenario for

many, many years and has put a great deal of resources to that

problem; it has used risk assessment in its process as well.

Mr. SHAYS. I am struck by the fact that when we look at risk,

it is really looking at the hazard versus times the exposure. It is

really the likelihood of an event.

But I also—I have a hard time separating or ignoring consequence. So even if something was not likely to occur but the consequence was so horrific, then I think that we need to put resources into it even though the likelihood is small. What becomes

difficult is that I can think of a lot of very large consequences that

could take place.

Mr. HINTON. I think one part of the process, Mr. Chairman,

would give you as decisionmakers and policymakers the various

scenarios that are at crosshairs so that those judgments can be

made. Right now, we don’t have that laid out before us, and I think

to get that type of a process working would enable that information

to come forward so that Congress, the executive branch, can make

informed judgments in this area.

Mr. SHAYS. I am going to conclude. I just happen to accept the

fact that you need a process, but it seems to me that process has

got to be very flexible, and it constantly has to be updated and analyzed because the process could really give us a false sense of comfort when we are totally ignoring something, and it seems to me

that you have to have the irrational be part of that process. What

is someone who is irrational going to do? If someone is willing to

die in the process—we make an assumption that as long as—they

wouldn’t do this because they would die; and that is not——

Mr. HINTON. We would not disagree with your view on that, Mr.

Chairman. In fact, I think one aspect of this is having hearings like

you are holding is to get more discussions going about this and find

out what is coming out of the process that is now taking place so

37

that you can raise whether or not all of those types of scenarios

have been considered as part of that process. I think that is a valid

question.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much. Your report is a helpful contributor to our—to those of us in Congress and in the administration, for those trying to sort this issue out. Thank you very much.

I always appreciate the work of your people. They make you look

good.

We call the next panel, Brian M. Jenkins, senior adviser to the

president, RAND; John V. Parachini, senior associate, Center for

Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies; Dr. Raymond Zilinskas, senior scientist in residence, Biological

and Toxin Arms Control, Monterey Institute of International Studies.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SHAYS. Note for the record that all three have responded in

the affirmative.

We will go right down the line starting with you, Mr. Jenkins.

STATEMENTS OF BRIAN M. JENKINS, SENIOR ADVISOR TO THE

PRESIDENT, RAND; JOHN V. PARACHINI, SENIOR ASSOCIATE,

CENTER FOR NONPROLIFERATION STUDIES, MONTERREY

INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL STUDIES; AND RAYMOND

ZILINSKAS, SENIOR SCIENTIST IN RESIDENCE, BIOLOGICAL

AND TOXIN ARMS CONTROL, MONTEREY INSTITUTE OF

INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

Mr. JENKINS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Mr. Blagojevich.

Thank you very much for inviting me to participate in these important discussions.

I have been given a number of opportunities to testify before

Congress on the topic of terrorism, the first time more than 25

years ago when I thought I knew a hell of a lot more than I know

today.

I have submitted a written statement summarizing my views on

the threat of whether a terrorist might use chemical or biological

weapons. Let me just underline a few of those points. In doing so,

I want to make it clear that, although I am an adviser to the president of the RAND Corp., my comments this morning are entirely

my own and do not reflect those of the RAND Corp. or any of its

sponsors.

The possibility that terrorists might resort to chemical or biological agents is not a new concern. People have been writing about

this for several decades. That it is only a matter of time before terrorists use such weapons is a relatively new idea which has become

kind of a new orthodoxy. What has brought about this change from

something that was considered an exotic possibility years ago to

the inevitability that we see it today?

There are several developments that give us cause for concern.

The growth of organized crime and corruption in Russia raise concerns about the security of its arsenal. While we have no direct evidence that chemical or biological substances have been stolen from

or sold by corrupt government officials in Russia, we have ample

examples of other weapons being sold through criminal organizations of strategic materials being stolen, and even small quantities

38

of nuclear material being stolen. So there is some cause for concern.

Also, a number of America’s foes and potential foes are conducting research on weapons of mass destruction. Several were mentioned in the earlier discussion this morning.

Another factor is that today’s terrorists seem more interested in

running up high body counts than in advancing political agendas.

In part this is a consequence of the change in motivations of terrorists, as we move away from ideological motivated terrorism and

into the realm of terrorism that is inspired by someone’s vision of

God.

The nerve gas attack in Tokyo subways may yet inspire repetition. Even the fact that we are having these public discussions may

alter the environment somewhat. Again, there are reasons for concern.

At the same time, we cannot conclude that a catastrophic terrorist attack involving chemical or biological weapons is inevitable.

The historical analysis provides no basis for forecasting such incidents. There is no inexorable progression from truck bombs to

weapons of mass destruction. In the more than 4 years since the

Tokyo attack, no group has attempted to do anything like it; that

is significant when we look at past terrorist and criminal innovations: hijackings, political kidnappings, malicious product tampering—those were innovations that were promptly imitated.

But even if it is correct, this assessment offers no comfort because every tentative conclusion that one can offer must be followed by the necessary caveat. Indeed, predictions call for the gift

of prophecy. I don’t think that we can do well in the realm of predicting with any degree of confidence what certainly will or will not

happen, I know that causes a certain amount of frustration on the

part of those such as yourselves who have to make decisions regarding how much resources should be devoted to the issue and

how to best allocate those resources. We are trying to make the uncertainty go away; it is very, very difficult to do that.

About the best we can do is an assessment of comparative

likelihoods. We can say with a degree of confidence that hoaxes,

which already have become a problem, will continue to be a problem. We can say that limited attacks seem more likely than largescale attacks. We can say that crude dispersal techniques in contained environments are more likely than poisoning cities.

But I would echo the report prepared by the GAO that we do

need a more comprehensive and in some cases a more rigorous

analysis, not to validate the threat or dismiss the threat. The issue

is not whether we can say ‘‘we don’t have to worry about it,’’ or ‘‘it

is imminent’’ and set off national panic.

But if we are going to prepare at all, we need to have some rational basis for allocating resources. You mentioned the figure $10

billion. Somebody decided on the basis of something that $10 billion is the right amount. How should we best allocate those resources? Should we spend another $10 billion? Or is even that not

enough to spend in the years that come? A high degree of uncertainty will remain. That is the reality upon which we are going to

have to make these decisions. Therefore we might try to comVerDate 11-MAY-2000 08:31 Aug 22, 2000 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00042 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\63765.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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pensate not only by trying to reduce the uncertainty but also by

adopting a strategy that takes into account that uncertainty.

First, we want to have a comprehensive analysis. That is not a

finite task. That requirement is going to continue as we gain more

information, as the threat evolves, as our analysis becomes more

sophisticated.

No. 2, we can’t wait for the results of the analysis; we have to

continue to prepare. We have to be willing to refine our efforts to

prepare as we learn more and refine our analysis. We are going to

have to be flexible whatever we do.

Third, we might want to look for opportunities to create capabilities that will have utility even if no terrorist attack occurs. For example, increasing our capability to respond to emergencies; improving our ability to detect, identify and treat infectious diseases; creating a more muscular public health service; improving measures

to ensure food safety are some of the things that we may want to

explore. Even if it is done in the context of terrorism, we nonetheless device public health benefits.

There is a final issue that we often ignore, and that is terrorism

always consists of two components. One is the actual event or set

of events that terrorists carry out. The second is the much broader

psychological effects of those terrorist incidents.

Even if a terrorist attack involving a biological or chemical agent

were to kill only a small number of people, as in Tokyo, instead of

the tens of thousands predicted in one of the recently publicized fictional scenarios, nonetheless if we did not communicate well, it

could provoke national hysteria. This is scary stuff.

Therefore, we need to plan our communications, educate the public in advance. We need to create a cadre of people who will provide

practical advice and act as a barrier against the misinformation

and rumors that will inevitably occur. That requires legislative initiatives, legislative support; and, should something happen, requires that each of you as Members of Congress act as calm, informed communicators. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. I was reminded while you were speaking, I represent

Fairfield, and in the late 1950’s the person who built my house

found that it was more lucrative for him to build the shelters for

a nuclear attack and so we had throughout Fairfield County people

building these shelters. This was a guy who was making a good

amount of money on homes, but he found it more advantageous to

build shelters.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Jenkins follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Parachini.

Mr. PARACHINI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for inviting me to this

hearing.

I think now is a very important time to do reevaluation of what

we see as the threat of chemical and biological weapons terrorism.

There were a number of events that really spun the country up to

look at this very carefully, first being the World Trade Center

bombing, then the bombing on the Tokyo subway, and the Oklahoma City bombing. And then there were a series of hearings in

the Senate chaired by Senators Roth and Nunn in which Senator

Lugar also participated that are entitled, Global Proliferation of

Weapons of Mass Destruction, and these hearings drew a lot of attention to the events in those cases.

I think at this point the threat is overstated, and so now is a

good time to reevaluate it, and so I commend you for doing that

at this time.

The GAO’s general call for a comprehensive threat assessment I

think is a good thing to do, although you have to recognize that

within the intelligence community and within the FBI there are

different methodologies that they employ to actually do the threat

assessments, so you have to figure out how to marry those different

methodologies. Law enforcement functions and intelligence functions are different, so you have to figure out some way to fit those

together and not take away the beauty that those different approaches also bring. But clearly an important part of the assessment has to be a multidisciplinary effort.

Most of how the threat has been evaluated in this country in the

last 4 years has been on vulnerability. We are potentially an infinitely vulnerable society. There are a lot of different components.

Vulnerability is certainly a part of it. Technological ease of acquiring and assembling these weapons is part of it.

That is not the only part. The part that has not been looked at

adequately and has not been discussed in public hearings—and I

commend you for trying to do this now—is to look at the behavioral

patterns of terrorists and their motivations. What exactly has been

the past cases where terrorists have done this in the few instances

where this has actually occurred?

If I can call upon the first chart—I am going to put up two charts

to sort of help make this point. Actually, the other one.

At the Monterey Institute of International Studies we are conducting a series of both qualitative and quantitative assessments

of terrorist incidents, and we have just concluded a series of qualitative case studies where we have asked the same questions. This

lists a series of cases which we looked at in the first volume that

will come out in January 2000, and it is a series of cases from 1946

until 1995. We had a number of authors who were experts on these

groups or in these regions of the world. They applied the same

questions. We then brought back all of the data and tried to compare across the cases to see what were common patterns. This is

valuable to help establish a bench line. It is not necessarily a clear

guide to the future, but it does create a benchmark for what we are

looking at.

At the moment, the worst-case scenarios are being spun out by

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grams, or evaluating the weapons programs of foreign countries,

not subnational groups or terrorists. That doesn’t mean that their

expertise is not relevant, but it means that their expertise captures

one part of the problem.

The other part of the problem is you have to actually look at

groups and what they have done. So that is what we tried to do

using open source information, interviewing the terrorists, interviewing people who know them, interviewing arresting officials and

prosecuting attorneys and reading all of the statements that the

terrorists have articulated, trying to see what were the agents that

they used and how did they get them and how were they apprehended.

Based on this work and another set of case studies that we will

be conducting in 1999 and the year 2000, we are beginning to get

some sense of a profile of what some of the groups are that will

use weapons of mass destruction, principally chemical and biological weapons, and we are beginning to understand what are some

of their patterns of behavior.

Some of the findings are that, in contrast to what we hear in

popular discussion, that this is a very complex task. Even very

smart people have difficulty doing it. And as you yourself noted,

there is a lot of technical expertise in the United States. Why isn’t

this happening more often? We should ask ourselves that question.

One, it is not that easy. So it is a technologically complex thing.

Two, it is sort of surprising how infrequent it is. Three, the people

who do want to use these types of agents for their particular purposes tend to be small groups or individuals. Those are very hard

for law enforcement people to penetrate—very hard.

And, finally, the people who are most motivated toward these attacks are people who we identify with the following characteristics.

They have charismatic leadership. They have no outside constituencies so they are internally focused. They don’t have the outside

constraints that most of us have in the socialization process. They

have an apocalyptic view of the world. They are often splinter—individual splinter groups or individuals. They have a sense of paranoia that tends to push them to want to use these when they feel

that law enforcement people are closing down on them. And they

have a sense of grandiosity. They are above the restraints that

most of us feel and that they may be impervious to the effects of

their action.

The beauty, fortunately, and I am not clear on how long we can

rely upon this, but the beauty is these are unusual characteristics.

These are not the political terrorist groups that we faced in the

1960’s, 1970’s and early 1980’s. These tend to be splinter groups or

loners. They tend to be religiously motivated groups or people who

are somewhat unstable, so there are self-limiting characteristics in

who these groups are. They tend to envision ways to perpetrate

their attacks that are not realistic. They tend to have visions that

are very difficult to carry out, so there is an upside story when you

begin profile who has done this in the past.

On the next chart you can see how we have tried to compare

across the various cases what some of these patterns are. The

beauty of identifying these patterns is it begins to focus us on what

agents are really relevant. It doesn’t mean that those will be the

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agents in the future, but at least we know what has been used in

the past. By looking at the incidence, it gives us some sense of the

magnitude of what did happen in the past, how many casualties

were there. You have asked this question several times. This is not

an arbitrary number. This is a number based on looking at the historical record.

One of the things that you do find is that industrial chemicals,

as was mentioned, and fairly common pathogens are more likely.

So are we scaling our response to deal with the more likely things

or are we scaling to deal with national strikes with very unusual

agents that were in foreign countries’ weapons programs that are

not very likely?

Let me finally comment on the report in a general sense as an

observer and a regular reviewer, both of hearings that you convene

and of reports that the General Accounting Office prepares.

Although I think a general call for comprehensive assessment is

valuable, I was struck when reviewing the report how caveated it

was in many ways. While I recognize that there is a beauty to that

reiterative process between the GAO and the various agencies, at

some point you have to begin to worry about when does it become

a negotiated product. And I think Congress, to perform its proper

oversight role, wants as crisp and as hard-edged reports as possible, even if it makes them unpopular. This issue is too important

to get sort of a negotiated product. In the end, you want clear

statements and judgments. People should be held accountable for

their judgments.

That is why we would have tried to ground our work in the historical record, and we recognize it is a historical record and not a

projection for the future. We wanted to have some benchmark for

our work and how we might project into the future.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Parachini follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Zilinskas, it is wonderful to have you here.

Mr. ZILINSKAS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is a thoroughly

enjoyable opportunity.

My written presentation has four parts. I will skip over my background. I will go directly into the preliminary findings of a project

that I am doing with the National Defense University, then I will

talk a bit about the GAO report, and I will conclude with some

thoughts on what might be done as far as meeting the biological

threat that faces us all.

As to the project that I am doing in collaboration with National

Defense University, we are trying to assess how the advanced biotechnologies might be fed into projects to develop biological weapons; our timeframe is the next 5 years. This is a pretty unique

project because nobody else has tried to objectively assess what genetic engineering can do for weaponization of agents.

Our approach is to assemble 16 of some of the foremost scientists

in the United States. They include virologists, microbiologists, geneticists, and others. We have met for 2 days as a focus group. The

report of this focus group meeting and the analysis of the conclusions will be published at the beginning of the year 2000, but I can

tell you a bit about the findings with the caveat that they are my

interpretations on what has happened so far. To reiterate the report is not finished, and it will contain the official word of the focus

group proceedings.

In the main, we find that the advanced biotechnologies are not

likely to be used, and there are two reasons for that. First, there

is something called pleomorphic effects when you genetically engineer an organism. These are effects that manifest themselves as

undesirable characteristics. So, for example, if you genetically engineer a bacterium to become antibiotic resistant, it might also show

other effects that will make it less useful a weapon agent.

So what happens, and this has happened many times in industry, is that the developer is able to successfully do what he wants

to do, but then ends up with an organism that is less virulent or

less resistant to environmental factors. So then the developer has

to go through another cycle of research and development, and then

he might end up with something else that is undesirable.

So our feeling is that the only kind of programs that could undertake this kind of activity are well-supported national programs that

are in it for the long-term. That is the first.

The second is simply a lack of basic information about natural

phenomenon such as host-parasite interrelationships, the infectious

processes, pathogenesis and so on.

There is a lot of information that is being generated in these

areas right now, but it is not to the point where it really can be

applied for weaponization.

We recognize fully well that the Soviet Union’s scientists did use

genetic engineering in research to produce some very, very frightening or theoretically frightening, hybrids; for example, a combination of the Ebola and the smallpox virus, but it does not make it

a weapon. It only means that they were working on it. It might

have taken them 5 or 10 years to succeed or then might fail entirely to make this kind of an organism into a real, useful

weaponized agent.

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In the course of focus group discussions, we came up with some

incidental findings. They include that the most likely scenario in

the next 5 years for a biological attack is that a common food-borne

or beverage-borne agent will be used to deliberately sabotage food

or beverages, and this certainly has the capability of injuring hundreds of people, but not thousands. An example occurreed in 1984

when there was an attack by the Rajneeshee group in Oregon of

10 salad bars that affected 751 persons; it is a harbinger for the

future.

Second, it is much less likely that an attack using an airborne

organism will take place, and that has to do with the technical difficulties of formulating the agents for an airborne attack. The problems, as was shown by the Aum Shinrikyo experience are two.

First, they used the wrong strain but second the technical part was

that they were not able to disperse the agent as an aerosol because

it clogged the nozzles. To overcome this kind of problem is rather

difficult. It takes a lot of time and a lot of experimentation.

So moving on to the second part, remarks on the GAO report, I

am not going to go into the good parts of it, but I will tell you about

the two problem areas that I had with it.

The first one, as a scientist, I had real problems with some of the

terminology, which I found——

Mr. SHAYS. For the record, we will note that someone from the

GAO smiled when you said that you were not going to go over the

good parts. Were there more good parts than bad parts?

Mr. ZILINSKAS. There were more bad parts, unfortunately.

They used terms like ‘‘valid’’ and ‘‘sound’’, which sound pretty

good when you read it, but are meaningless when you really look

at them. Are you going to use valid data versus—what—invalid

data? Are you going to use sound information or do a sound assessment versus—what—an unsound assessment? I found this very irritating, and I guess it hindered me to some point to—well, maybe

not.

And then the second part is that the heart of this report is that

it recommends risk assessments to be done, but doesn’t provide

ideas on methods.

I listened to the GAO talking about methodology. They were not

talking about methodology whatsoever. They were saying that they

should put together an interdisciplinary team, they should get information from national intelligence estimates, whatever that is. Is

that a bunch of guesses or are they hard facts? I don’t know. And

so on.

But there is no set methodology, and I give an example in my

report of a scientific way of doing scientific assessment done by the

EPA when it considers the introduction of genetic engineered organisms into the environment.

I also give an example of how I used this protocol, the EPA protocol, to do a risk assessment involving the introduction of genetically

engineered marine organisms into the open environment, and

found out that I could not do a risk assessment. Hey, there is nothing wrong with saying we can’t do the risk assessment because the

necessary information is not available. And I find that the necessary information as far as terrorist organizations is not there,

and it mainly has to do with capabilities. There is no way that you

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can know what the capabilities are unless you look at each organization individually and then somehow find out if they have access

to it, microbiologists, chemists, doctors. And, furthermore, whether

or not these people are willing to lend their skills for illicit purposes.

The second bigger problem has to do with intent. There is no way

that anyone can read the mind of a terrorist. For example, my experience with Iraq, people often ask why did they acquire biological

weapons? We don’t know why they acquired them because the only

one who has that knowledge in his brain in Saddam Hussein, and

no one can read that brain.

In conclusion, my feeling is that you cannot do a risk assessment

under the terms that is discussed in the report. What do we do

then?

Well, my feeling is that you take a common sense approach, and

the common sense approach, as far as I am concerned, is to try to

figure out what is the large biological threat facing the United

States. It is really natural disease outbreaks; specifically emerging

diseases, reemerging infectious diseases and transported infectious

diseases in other words, diseases coming from somewhere else.

And if we can do something that meets this threat, the overwhelming threat of natural infectious diseases, then we have gone

a long ways toward at least also being able to alleviate the

aftereffects of biological attacks by terrorists.

There is another part of that which I don’t go into that much,

which is how do you prevent terrorist attacks. The only way that

you can prevent them is by having good intelligence. That is something that I don’t know anything about because it is mostly classified. How do you set up a good intelligence-gathering system

through the intelligence agencies and the police forces?

I say, first of all, deal with the public health and the medical aspects, and then we are in a good place to deal with the terrorist

aftereffects. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Zilinskas follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I am going to call on my colleague, but I am struck

by the fact that your statement was that it is hard to make common sense out of terrorists. So it is interesting how we would use

a common sense approach.

Mr. ZILINSKAS. The common sense approach is to say that the

greater threat is natural infectious diseases. What can we do about

them? Meeting this threat has to do with surveillance, monitoring,

and, improving emergency response to outbreaks.

You have to remember when there is a disease outbreak you

don’t know at its beginning whether it is a natural outbreak or it

is a deliberately caused outbreak. Therefore, the response of public

health responders and medical people will be the same regardless

of what it is. It is only after 2, 3, or 5 days that you can determine

this. This could have been a terrorist or biological attack. At that

time, the police enters into it, and there is a whole—then you try

to get evidence.

Mr. SHAYS. It is interesting because we had an example of encephalitis in my District and in New York City, and the New Yorker or New York magazine had some unnamed source who talked

about the possibly that this might be a terrorist attack, and then

we got a lot of calls. And it was interesting how just even the inference got people very excited.

Mr. ZILINSKAS. I got a lot of calls from reporters on that incident,

and it happens each time there is an unusual disease outbreak. For

example, the hantavirus outbreak in 1993 was like that. I was getting calls from Albuquerque, Denver, asking, could that have been

a biological attack? I said, no.

Mr. SHAYS. We are going to try to finish before we leave—we

have like 10 minutes.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Thank you.

Dr. Zilinskas, if I can just followup, you are suggesting that the

enhancement of the ability of public health and health delivery systems to respond to these disease outbreaks is essential. Can you

give us some more suggestions on how you would enhance the public health sector so they can respond properly?

Mr. ZILINSKAS. What happens when you have a disease outbreak

of any type, you suddenly have a lot of people who become sick.

First of all, you have to treat these people in an adequate way. The

problem of treating a large number of people might overwhelm

local systems. Therefore, we have to do an assessment of what local

systems can do. And then, if they are in a situation where they

can’t handle a large outbreak, what kind of assistance can be immediately available at the State level and eventually, the Federal

level, and that includes military forces.

I would imagine that a large disease outbreak there would create

a lot of logistical problems, and maybe, problems having to do with

deciding who has authority and so on. All of that has to be solved.

That is the treatment part.

The second part is the investigation to find out what the etiology

of the disease was, and that involves using trained people in epidemiology, both molecular and classic epidemiology, and having them

immediately available for this kind of work.

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So I think that is important, to increase our capabilities at the

local and at the State levels especially to immediately investigate

disease outbreaks.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Thank you, Dr. Zilinskas.

Mr. Jenkins, you also suggest that, rather than focusing on probability predictions and infinite vulnerabilities, we instead work toward creating capabilities that will help us with or without chemical or biological attack. You mention enhancing intelligence and

improving food safety. What do you think should be done to help

prepare the public infrastructure with regard to that?

Mr. JENKINS. I think some of the comments just made would address that particular issue. My point is to find areas where we can

devote resources, since we are spending this money, that we will

get permanent benefit out of it.

If we go back in our own history in this country, we have had

experience with large-scale outbreaks of infectious diseases. We at

one time had a very powerful U.S. Public Health Service with extraordinary authority granted to it to deal with outbreaks of typhoid, yellow fever, Spanish flu and things of this sort.

As we have become a somewhat safer society, we have lost some

of that capability. Now that we are faced again with the reappearance of some of these diseases as a result of increased global travel,

global food supplies, some of these issues have reemerged, and we

have to go back and develop some of these capabilities.

Mr. BLAGOJEVICH. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Parachini, I was struck by the fact that you

wanted to look at the events that have already taken place and try

to analyze the behavior, and I was just struck by the fact that I

didn’t feel that they were as relevant because I don’t think they are

a precursor of what is going to happen in the future.

Now, I guess I would have no likely basis for making that, but

it seems some of it was domestically focused. In other words, in

many instances they were domestic terrorism. I am struck with the

information that I have seen that our biggest concern is not domestic.

Mr. PARACHINI. Most of the cases now that the FBI is looking

into, about 85 percent are domestic threats. The variety of threats

we face now, we previously had always thought of foreign threats.

We did not think that this would happen here in the United States,

but Oklahoma City should be the clear signal that there are

threats here that are domestic.

If indeed it is right that there are all of these capabilities here

in this country to procure materials, many of them commercially

available, there are plenty—this is a large country with a lot of

people with different agendas. It seems to me no accident that the

FBI is mainly following domestic cases and not foreign cases.

Mr. SHAYS. Right. But when we were overseas—I was struck by

the fact that in one country they were trying to explain to us that

the United States can bully every nation—and I don’t mean that

in a pejorative sense. We have incredible military powers, so we

force our adversaries to look at other ways to deal with the United

States.

Mr. PARACHINI. So they may be looking at asymmetrical attacks,

and I want to draw a distinction on asymmetrical attacks on our

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forces abroad and asymmetrical attacks here within the United

States. I think it is harder—the closer you get into the United

States, it is harder to do. And we have within our own borders

many people who have strong grievances against the Federal Government or against other people who are willing to do that.

Mr. SHAYS. I guess what I am going to say is that I think your

analysis is more valuable as it relates to how we would respond to

a domestic attack. It would probably be a little easier for us to take

that information and then translate it into something useful. But

I think we are facing a whole new potential level of activity that

we can’t draw on the past.

Let me ask the other two to respond to that in any way that you

want.

Mr. JENKINS. Could I add a comment to that? I think there is

some relevance in the historical analysis that has been done here.

First of all, there are incidents drawn from various parts of the

world. There is Aum Shrinrikyo. There are other things that have

happened outside of the United States.

During the same period of time, if we take those incidents that

have happened since 1970, discarding the first one on the top of

that list, there were 11 incidents; 11 incidents out of what are more

than 10,000 international terrorists incidents. If we indeed add domestic terrorists incidents around the world, we are talking about

a universe of tens of thousands.

The fact that there have been very few. It doesn’t give us an actuarial chart, it doesn’t give us the scientific confidence that we

would want to have, but, nonetheless, it does permit an inference

that this is a pretty rare event.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me respond to that, because you really triggered

something. I was here in 1968 as an intern for what I think was

the first hijacking of an airliner to Cuba. The first became—we lost

track of the number. So I am struck by the fact that if we use that

kind of analysis, we never would have thought that there would be

a hijacking of a plane and then wouldn’t have been able to deal

with the plethora of attacks that followed.

Mr. JENKINS. I agree with the fact that history does not suggest

that things cannot occur. There are always going to be unprecedented events.

However, a number of groups have looked at this, a number of

groups have certainly contemplated this, and some attempts have

been made. What is striking is the lack of imitation, to go back to

your own analogy. The first politically motivated hijacking took

place in 1968. Within the following 4 years, we were dealing with

hundreds of hijackings that forced us to take extraordinary security

measures. In the 4 years since Tokyo, we haven’t seen anything.

Mr. SHAYS. You have made that point.

Let me tell you the challenge. We have a series of votes. We have

your statements in the record, and they are all valuable and helpful. We are just scratching the surface.

I am going to adjourn the hearing because we will be tied up for

a bit, and I do not want to hold you. Thank you very much.

[Whereupon, at 12:20 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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